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Pictures of really, really big hard drives
Some seriously manly storage from the 1950s & 60s
Bryan Lunduke
July 28, 2023
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What follows are pictures of hard drives.

Really, really big ones.

From the 1950s and 1960s.

For no other reason than simply because they look awesome.  Enjoy.

1956: The IBM RAMAC

Check out this beauty.  The first commercial hard drive.  "Random Access Method of Accounting and Control": RAMAC.

1956_RAMAC_P1.jpg

 

See those platters?  Each one is 24 inches in diameter.  Two feet!  And there's 50 of them!

Dimensions: 5' high x 6' wide

Weight: Over one ton

Total capacity: 3.75 MB

And here she is being loaded onto an airplane.

1956_RAMAC_P5.jpg

I mean... dang.  What if that hard drive fell over?  "How'd he die?"  "He was crushed to death by a hard drive."

Here's a few more pictures.  Because it's awesome.

The IBM 305 RAMAC, the First Computer with a Hard Drive: $10,000 perMegabyte : History of Information

IBM 305 RAMAC System - CHM Revolution

The Brilliant “Baloney Slicer” That Started the Digital Age - Nautilus

1961: Bryant Series 4000

Here is a personal favorite of mine (doesn't everyone have favorite 60 year old hard drive models?): The Bryant Series 4000.

Dimensions: 52" x 70" x 70"

Total capacity: Variable (see chart below) -- up to 205 MB!

Seriously.  Up to 205 MB.  In the 1960s!  How crazy is that!

But then you look at this picture below... and it all makes sense.  Those are some big, stinkin' platters!  39 inches in diameter... and it could hold up to 26 of them!

I mean... whoah!  I wonder what sounds that drive made when seeking and reading data...

1962: IBM 1311

The IBM 1311 packed in six 14" diammeter platters into a single "disk pack".  And each 10 lbs disk pack was removable.  Making this a removable hard drive system.  Pretty nifty.

IBM_1311_disk_drive_at_CHM.jpg

Dimensions: "About the size of a top load washing machine"

Total capacity: "2 million characters" or "25,000 punch cards" (this was heavily marketed at replacing punch cards)

CR11hixWsAAgmcV.jpg

IBM Archives: IBM 1311 head assembly

IBM Archives: IBM 1311

I tell ya.

They just don't make 'em like they used to.

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That means $3 / Month. Or $27 / Year (which works out to $2.25 / Month).

Via Lunduke.Locals.com:

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The Famous Lifetime Subscription:

The "World Famous Lunduke Journal Lifetime Subscription" is exactly what it sounds like. Pay once and get full access to The Lunduke Journal. For life.

And now, through Friday, May 9th… you can snag one at a crazy discount. Normally these are $200… but you can grab one for $100. (You can also pay more if you’d like to donate a little extra.)

The Lifetime Subscription can be obtained via Locals, Substack, or using Bitcoin. All three options work great and are super easy. Scroll down and choose your option.

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How to get a Lifetime Subscription with Bitcoin:

You can also obtain a Lifetime Subscription via Bitcoin.

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Want to be able to download every show The Lunduke Journal releases (and watch them on whatever device you like)? Yeah. You can do that. For 50% off.

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Make a One Time Donation

Subscription not enough (or not your thing)? Want to toss in a one-time donation to The Lunduke Journal? There’s a few great options!

Via BitCoin:

Send any amount of BTC to the following address:

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  • Email "bryan at lunduke.com" with to let us know it was you! You can choose to keep your donation anonymous if you prefer. (Either way, all BTC donations get included in the matching deal.)

Via Locals:

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You Make This Possible

A huge thank you to all of the subscribers who have made The Lunduke Journal possible. Because of you, we have been able to do true Tech Journalism — to tell the stories that no other Tech News outlet has the cajones to touch.

And to all of you new Lunduke Journal subscribers: Welcome to the last bastion of truly independent, Big-Tech-Free, ad-free, non-Woke Tech Journalism.

-Lunduke

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